Penn Satire, Since 1899

Ancient Greek Life

by Arnolf Bentham

Arnolf Bentham is a busy man in between his tremendous philanthropic efforts and historical research endeavors, but he has found the time to generously bestow upon us one of his more interesting findings in his work…

Historians recently recovered a missing excerpt from Plato’s Republic, one of the earliest and most influential philosophical works of Western society. In the book, Socrates and his students create the model for the perfect society through a series of dialogues. This missing excerpt may provide clues to what Socrates was seeking in the Greek social environment, and it may in fact have laid the groundwork for what eventually became known as the ‘fraternity.’

“Now Glaucon, it is of our interest to have sex with beautiful women, correct?”

“Why of course, Socrates.”

“And it is generally not in the interest of beautiful women to have sex with us, am I wrong?”

“No, you are assuredly not wrong on this issue.”

“So tell me Glaucon, under normal circumstances beautiful women would not have sex with us, although we desire this. Do you agree with this?”

“Why surely, that seems logical.”

“Then, in order to achieve what we desire, while also allowing the women to be pleased with the result, we must make the women desire sex with us. Do you agree that this is the logical conclusion?”

“Yes, the validity of this conclusion cannot be questioned.”

“Good. Now I will digress for a moment, but you will soon understand why I choose to do so.”

“I trust your reasoning as always.”

“Is it not right to say that the most holy of all drinks is wine, because of its ability to make people do what they would not do under normal circumstances?”

“It is certainly right to say that. “

“And would you agree that wine often has the effect of making people want to have sex more than they would when not drinking wine?”

“Why of course, Socrates. But what are you getting at?”

“Patience, Glaucon. Now you have said that women do not wish to have sex under normal circumstances, and wine makes people want to have sex. These are your opinions?”

“Through your careful reasoning, yes. These are my opinions.”

“And tell me, Glaucon. If a woman were under the effects of wine would she be more willing to have sex?”

“Ah, I see what you are getting at.”

“So you agree?”

“Most certainly. “

“So what is the only logical course of action to take, regarding women and wine?”